Children's mental representation of referential relations : representational partitioning and "theory of mind"

In six experiments I investigated children’s handling of intensional contexts. The results were described in terms of a developmental extension of Fauconnier’s mental spaces account of meaning representation. Implications for children’s mentalistic development were explored. In chapter 1 I considered the “referential opacity” raised by the representational nature of the mind. I interpreted the findings of Russell (1987) as evidence for a developmental dissociation between handling of intensional contexts - due to the partial nature of representations - and “intentional” referential problems - due to representations being outdated or hypothetical. In experiments 1-3 I demonstrated this dissociation explicitly, and showed that it extended to non-linguistic intensional contexts. Experiments 4 &5 showed correlations between children’s handling of intensional contexts and linguistic ambiguity, which I explained by their common requirement that representational content be held as partial. Experiment 6 showed that children’s handling of intensional questions (and mentalistic explanations) improved after observing incorrect action on the basis of partial knowledge. This effect of supporting context was short-lived, suggesting that it supported on-line activity not question comprehension. After earlier success with out-dated and hypothetical representations, children’s handling of partial representations at 6-7 years explains their concurrent late success with intensional contexts and linguistic ambiguity, and constitutes a qualitative change in their representational abilities

Developmental differences in the control of action selection by social information

Our everyday actions are often performed in the context of a social interaction. We previously showed that, in adults, selecting an action on the basis of either social or symbolic cues was associated with activations in the fronto-parietal cognitive control network, whereas the presence and use of social versus symbolic cues was in addition associated with activations in the temporal and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) social brain network. Here we investigated developmental changes in these two networks. Fourteen adults (21–30 years of age) and 14 adolescents (11–16 years) followed instructions to move objects in a set of shelves. Interpretation of the instructions was conditional on the point of view of a visible “director” or the meaning of a symbolic cue (Director Present vs. Director Absent) and the number of potential referent objects in the shelves (3-object vs. 1-object). 3-object trials elicited increased fronto-parietal and temporal activations, with greater left lateral prefrontal cortex and parietal activations in adults than adolescents. Social versus symbolic information led to activations in superior dorsal MPFC, precuneus, and along the superior/middle temporal sulci. Both dorsal MPFC and left temporal clusters exhibited a Director × Object interaction, with greater activation when participants needed to consider the directors' viewpoints. This effect differed with age in dorsal MPFC. Adolescents showed greater activation whenever social information was present, whereas adults showed greater activation only when the directors' viewpoints were relevant to task performance. This study thus shows developmental differences in domain-general and domain-specific PFC activations associated with action selection in a social interaction context

Bilingual education enhances creative fluency and flexibility over the first year of primary school

Can exposure to a foreign language in the first year of school enhance divergent thinking skills? Ninety-nine monolingual children from predominantly White neighbourhoods (MAge = 57.7 months, SD 1.2; 47 girls) attending bilingual schools, schools with weekly foreign language lessons, or schools without a foreign language provision (= controls) completed a divergent thinking and executive function tasks at the beginning of the school year and 24 weeks later. The groups did not differ on creativity measures at the beginning of the school year. Only bilingual school children and weekly language learners improved divergent thinking at the second testing point, with the former significantly outperforming controls on creative fluency and flexibility. Improvements could not be explained by executive function development. Therefore, a considerable amount of exposure to a foreign language in early formal education appears to boost creative thinking

Bilingual education enhances creative fluency and flexibility over the first year of primary school

Can exposure to a foreign language in the first year of school enhance divergent thinking skills? Ninety-nine monolingual children from predominantly White neighbourhoods (MAge = 57.7 months, SD 1.2; 47 girls) attending bilingual schools, schools with weekly foreign language lessons, or schools without a foreign language provision (= controls) completed a divergent thinking and executive function tasks at the beginning of the school year and 24 weeks later. The groups did not differ on creativity measures at the beginning of the school year. Only bilingual school children and weekly language learners improved divergent thinking at the second testing point, with the former significantly outperforming controls on creative fluency and flexibility. Improvements could not be explained by executive function development. Therefore, a considerable amount of exposure to a foreign language in early formal education appears to boost creative thinking

Current knowledge on the role of the inferior frontal gyrus in Theory of Mind - a commentary on Schurz and Tholen (2016)

Schurz and Tholen (2016) argue that common approaches to studying the neural basis of “theory of mind” (ToM) obscure a potentially important role for inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) in managing conflict between perspectives, and urge new work to address this question: “to gain a full understanding of the IFG's role in ToM, we encourage future imaging studies to use a wider range of control conditions.” (p332). We wholeheartedly agree, but note that this observation has been made before, and has already led to a programme of work that provides evidence from fMRI, EEG, and TMS on the role of IFG in managing conflict between self and other perspectives in ToM. We highlight these works, and in particular we demonstrate how careful manipulation within ToM tasks has been used to act as an internal control condition, wherein conflict has been manipulated within-subject. We further add to the discussion by framing key questions that remain regarding IFG in the context of these. Using limitations in the existing research, we outline how best researchers can proceed with the challenge set by Schurz and Tholen (2016)

Mindreading quality versus quantity:A theoretically and empirically motivated two-factor structure for individual differences in adults’ mindreading

Existing methods for studying individual differences in adults’ mindreading often lack good psychometric characteristics. Moreover, it remains unclear, even in theory, how mindreading varies in adults who already possess an understanding of mental states. In this pre-registered study, it was hypothesised that adults vary in their motivation for mindreading and in the degree to which their answers on mindreading tasks are appropriate (context-sensitive). These factors are confounded in existing measures as they do not differentiate between the frequency of mental state terms (MST), indicative of motivation, and the quality of an explanation. Using an innovative scoring system, the current study examined whether individual differences in adult undergraduate psychology students’ (N = 128) answer quality and / or quantity of explicit references to others’ mental states on two open-ended response mindreading tasks were separable constructs, accounted for by mindreading motivation, and related differentially to measures previously linked with mindreading (e.g., religiosity, loneliness, social network size). A two-factor and one-factor model both provided acceptable fit. Neither model showed significant associations with mindreading motivation. However, a two-factor model (with MST and response appropriateness loading onto separate factors) provided greater explanatory power. Specifically, MST was positively associated with religiosity and response appropriateness was negatively associated with religiosity, whilst the one-factor solution did not predict any socially relevant outcomes. This provides some indication that mindreading quantity and mindreading quality may be distinguishable constructs in the structure of individual differences in mindreading

Mindreading quality versus quantity:A theoretically and empirically motivated two-factor structure for individual differences in adults’ mindreading

Existing methods for studying individual differences in adults’ mindreading often lack good psychometric characteristics. Moreover, it remains unclear, even in theory, how mindreading varies in adults who already possess an understanding of mental states. In this pre-registered study, it was hypothesised that adults vary in their motivation for mindreading and in the degree to which their answers on mindreading tasks are appropriate (context-sensitive). These factors are confounded in existing measures as they do not differentiate between the frequency of mental state terms (MST), indicative of motivation, and the quality of an explanation. Using an innovative scoring system, the current study examined whether individual differences in adult undergraduate psychology students’ (N = 128) answer quality and / or quantity of explicit references to others’ mental states on two open-ended response mindreading tasks were separable constructs, accounted for by mindreading motivation, and related differentially to measures previously linked with mindreading (e.g., religiosity, loneliness, social network size). A two-factor and one-factor model both provided acceptable fit. Neither model showed significant associations with mindreading motivation. However, a two-factor model (with MST and response appropriateness loading onto separate factors) provided greater explanatory power. Specifically, MST was positively associated with religiosity and response appropriateness was negatively associated with religiosity, whilst the one-factor solution did not predict any socially relevant outcomes. This provides some indication that mindreading quantity and mindreading quality may be distinguishable constructs in the structure of individual differences in mindreading

Is goal ascription possible in minimal mindreading?

In this response to the commentary by Michael and Christensen, we first explain how minimal mindreading is compatible with the development of increasingly sophisticated mindreading behaviours that involve both executive functions and general knowledge, and then sketch one approach to a minimal account of goal ascription